Neptune Aquatics

Feeding Zoas & Mushrooms (And Phyto Feast Question)

I'm thinking of trying to feed my zoas and shrooms. Some of the LFS have told me it will help them grow faster. If this is the case, what should I feed them and how do I feed them? I've tried feeding the zoas small bits of mysis, but they never actually eat it. I put some mysis on my smaller mushroom species (1"-2" ones) and they don't seem to eat it, while the larger species (like my hairy mushrooms) have no problem eating them. I purchased some phyto feast today at All About Fish because they said all of my corals would eat it. They told me all zoas and mushrooms are filter feeders, is that true? If so, will they eat the phyto feast? I noticed that they changed the dosage on it, so now it says 1-5 drops per gallon or 1-5 teaspoons per 100 gallons. My 34g tank has about 25 or less gallons of water volume when you add in the rocks, the corals, the sand, and all of the other stuff. How much should I put in? Thanks. :)

EDIT: Does the Phyto Feast help things like brain corals?
 
Mathew, if you go to the Reef Nutrition website you can read what animals feed on Phyto Feast. Did you understand what Mr Ugly posted? The zoas and mushrooms have food available if you have fish, crabs, worms... in the tank.
 
Matthew we have not touched the directions on PF in like 4 years. its always been 1 drop a gallon - up t 5 drops a gallon.

Im afraid you have been misinformed about what eats PF. Very few corals fed directly upon PF but many will fed on the zooplanktoon that does eat PF.

The mushrooms you have do not really eat particulate feeds but rather utilize nutrients (DOC).

The best Reef Nutrition products for zoanthids are Roti-Feast and Oyster-Feast. they do not eat phytoplankton.
 
When I kept a healthy stocking of zoanthid and palythoa they thrived on the detritus (various poop) that got stirred up during my water change. In fact, the way I changed my water left a light dusting of detritus for the coral to 'eat'. I never fed them directly. Actually, I tried with NLS pellet or mysis but I didn't really keep up with it. Detritus or poop was sufficient to keep them growing and healthy.

HTH
 
If you want them to grow fast, feeding is the way. If you don't care about how fast they grow, not feeding is fine. Most people that "farm" them feed them.
 
Do you add anything like zoe or zoecon, or any other vitamin/amino acid supplement, my zoas love it when I add that to the tank, the colors of my corals also improve, great for fish health too, I use it for soaking food for my tang primarily (got her for free cause she has HLLE:( ) she hasnt gotten much better but she had it for a good while before I got her.

I have heard that people farming zoas prefer a dirty tank vs a clean one, due to them being filter feeders, but that is what ive heard

robert - eastbayreefer2010
 
Who are you asking, me?

I use no HUFA, amino or vitamin supplements as all that is in the food I feed to my tank. I prefer to get that stuff naturally into my tank via Reef Nutrition products.

The people I know farming zoa's keep clean tanks and feed. Dirty tanks + light = algae and no one wants to by algae ridden frags ;)
 
OK, no real advice here, but if you want to try feeding just for fun, turn off your pumps and add some LIVE BRINE SHRIMP. They may not be very nutritious (I guess if you feed them phyto-feast first that might help) but for pure maniacally evil fun, they are a blast.

Then sit back and watch the horrors of brine shrimp getting eaten by everything. I once watched for 5-10 minutes as a brine shrimps tail got captured by a zoa (or paly, I can't remember) and slowly, inexorably, the shrimp got pulled into the mouth. Cruel, but that's life. It was my one evil pleasure. You kinda feel bad for them, since they suck at swimming but ... they are destined to be food. I bought the BS at the LFS. I've also hatched BS which is more nutritious, but not so gruesome as they are much smaller and you can't see the epic struggle.

V
 
Oh no.... not the poor Sea Monkeys!

But really, Matthew doesn't need to be putting any more stuff into his tank. Food or otherwise.

Or next he'll be asking about Algaefix, Chemiclean, Erythromycin, and a bunch of other stuff we don't want him to use :D
 
CHEMICLEAN IS BAD?! :O
What does it do that is so bad?
Ooopsies... :tired:

It is a lot of work keeping the biocube clean, but I put some zoas and mushrooms in there and hopfully they'll grow fast. I don't have any cleanup crew in the tank so there is lots of poo to eat.

I've turned off the filters and fed live brine before. I watched the tank for 10 minutes. My clownfish enjoyed chasing them.
 
I bought Sea Monkey's as a kid, they never played with me or played chess in a castle or whatever. So now they will pay ...
In fact maybe tonight I'll hatch up a bunch of innocent bbs.


V
 
Back
Top